System Change

“Golem cores?” Derek asked.

“Yes,” Alanah replied. “Golem cores. I was going over the information I… borrowed for our dungeon adventure the other day and came across a pretty unique dungeon close to Cordonia.”

“I knew there was more than one reason you would bring me here,” Derek said with a chuckle.

“More like I knew we needed to come here, so I looked around to find what else we could do around here so we wouldn’t waste too much time,” the siren explained.

“In that case,” Derek said. “Go ahead and lead the way. Brandi has been doing extraordinary things with the mana cores I got from those lower-level golems, so if we can get her some from some higher-level golems, then that would be amazing.”

“I thought that would be the case,” Alanah said, then began jogging down the street. “I was able to examine one of her mana core powered swords. It was quite the piece of work. The quality isn’t quite there yet, but the ingenuity is. One day, probably soon, she will give The Walking Forge a run for his money.”

“Don’t let Tyron hear you say that,” Derek laughed as he kicked off the ground and began running beside the woman. “Imagine telling him that a fifteen-year-old girl was closing in on him just two years after unlocking the system.”

“Mhm,” Alanah agreed as she increased her speed. “Though, once you get to the point where he is—where… others are—the smallest improvements become major accomplishments. She will hit that wall once her level and skills reach a certain point. That is where you will find out what she’s made of.”

“Yeah,” Derek said. “I can see that.” Soon, the duo formed from the combination of two of the strongest people on the continent was moving at a blur to most other people. They were careful to avoid any pedestrian and did their best not to affect anyone on the street. What they were doing was frowned upon in most places, but it was less rude than simply jumping into the sky and moving above the city. Besides, the majority of people was barely able to notice them before they passed.

“If she chooses to, she can make a fantastic living anywhere on the continent by crafting bulk weapons for kingdoms and adventurers, and there’s nothing wrong with that. But her growth and progression will halt or at least severely slow.”

“She knows,” Derek said. Marrick had given some of the same lessons to her before he departed. “But I don’t think we have to worry about that with her. She’s not the type to settle like that. The only time I can imagine her bulk crafting weapons or armor is if it’s for those she cares about—which I still imagine she would put as much effort as possible equipping them—or if it’s for materials that she needs, or money to obtain them.”

“Good,” Alanah said with a nod as they reached the gates to the city.

“H-halt!” an elven guard atop the wall half yelled as he breathed in a deep breath. There was no need for him to say or do anything, though, as Alanah and Derek had already stopped once they arrived at the gates.

“Ah,” Derek said. “We’re doing this all official-like.”

“It’s faster if we have to come back to use this teleporter,” Alanah said, then pulled the papers out of her storage ring and tossed them to the guard who barely had time to see and catch them before they hit him in the chest.

“Nice throw,” Derek said.

“Uh…” the guard muttered before finally moving his eyes from the duo to the papers. “Oh… I see.” The man tossed the papers back to Alanah without doing anything else to them. “The token?” he asked.

Both Alanah and Derek turned their bodies a bit, just to where he could see the adventurer’s badge and Token of Merit on their arms.

“Very good,” the guard said as he bowed. “You may enter and exit any proper city within Indria. We have been made aware of the token’s status. There is no need for any extra papers when entering and exiting our cities,” he explained. The guard pulled a crystal out of his storage and in the next moment, the gate began to open. “I wish the honored guests luck in their adventures.” He bowed deeply once again.

Alanah raised her eyebrows, then turned to look at Derek.

“Neat,” he said with a shrug. “I guess Indria is really on top of their game. I wonder how far behind Indaria and Cydaria are lagging when it comes to the tokens.”

“Quite far, I would imagine,” Alanah replied, then nodded toward the guard and began walking through the gate at a slower pace.

“Probably,” Derek said as he followed beside her. “Osian is pretty good about running a tight ship. It definitely makes more sense that Indria is already prepared. Though it does make me wonder if we came here too late.”

“I don’t think so,” Alanah said. “Like you said, those children have been here for a long time and seemed more than okay. And the shop clerk wasn’t able to lie to us.”

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“True,” Derek said. With one last step, the duo made it outside the city gates and they began to close behind them. Derek looked back over his shoulder to see the tightly shut gates. “It’s even nice from the outside,” he said. The city had walls, but they were just raised stones from earth mages with vines growing all over them.

“Yes, it is. Most elven settlements have this in common. They really are one with nature,” Alanah said with a wistful sigh.

Derek nodded, then walked closer to the wall and placed his hand on one of the large vines. Instantly, a thorn grew and tried to skewer his hand. Of course, it didn’t even leave a mark on him. “I was wondering what would happen if someone or something just tried to climb the walls by using the vines… now I know.”

“They definitely help keep out the mid to lower-level criminals and beasts,” Alanah said. “But it can also help slow down those who aren’t weak. Which can give the guards more time to prepare if needed.”

“I can see that,” Derek said, before turning back to Alanah. “So, do you know where we’re going?” he asked.

“I will,” Alanah replied, then, with a flick of her wrist, a map appeared in her hands. She unfolded it, then studied it for a short time. Finally, she folded the map back up and it disappeared back into her storage ring. “It’s that way,” she said as she pointed northeast of where they were. “About five hours away at a brisk walk.”

“A brisk walk, huh?” Derek laughed. “That’s like what? Half an hour for us at a medium pace?”

“Something like that,” Alanah replied as her body began vibrating at a speed that Derek could barely make out. Once it hit a certain speed, she didn’t look any different from usual, but her body began to raise into the air. “Let’s go,” she said once she was a good twenty or thirty feet high.

“Race you there.” Derek kicked off the ground and activated Void Steps. With the skill going, he was able to stay in the air beside the woman.

“That wouldn’t be fair to you,” Alanah replied. The next instant, she disappeared.

“Oh, shit!” Derek smiled widely. She’s fast, and that’s not even with her transformed into that other version of herself, he thought. Finally, making sure he was facing the correct direction, he activated Powerstride and used it to its full potential.

It took Derek a couple of minutes longer to arrive at the dungeon than Alanah had. She was already waiting for him when he got there. It wasn’t exactly his fault that she ended up waiting—her directions were slightly off, and he had missed it by a fair distance before he realized something was wrong. Powerstride was still not the easiest skill for him to control—especially at level one. But, on the bright side, on his way to the dungeon, he was able to bring the skill up a level to level two.

Still, once Derek released he had to have missed the dungeon, he just opened a tunnel with Void Travel and sensed where the siren had vanished to before closing it and heading that way. It would have been a little quicker if he’d just stepped inside and traveled to her that way, but he would prefer to use this time to level his under-leveled skills than using the ones that were already maxed out or didn’t have levels to begin with. Except for Channel Void, Derek thought. I’m definitely going to need that skill while inside this dungeon.

If what Alanah said was right, they would be entering a golem dungeon, and the best way to deal with those monsters was a nice punch to the core while channeling void energy into his fist.

“Took you long enough,” Alanah said once Derek arrived. She was standing by a light gray floating dungeon orb.

“I’m surprised there’s nobody around here,” Derek said as he surveyed the surrounding area.

“Golem dungeons.” Alanah shrugged. “There aren’t many people who enjoy them because they don’t really give materials to use or sell, and, as far as I know, the completion reward isn’t worth the pain of dealing with golems or running the dungeon over and over for a small chance at more rewards,” she explained.

“They don’t give materials for most people,” Derek corrected. “But with my methods.” He covered his hand in purple void energy and punched out. “They give some really good material,” he said. “Besides, I’ve not found a better opponent for leveling my skills yet. They don’t drop a ton of experience, and there aren’t too many of them, so you can focus on skill grinding with leveling yourself much.” That was his favorite thing about the golem dungeon outside of Savannah.

“True,” Alanah said. “But for most people, to enter a level 250 golem dungeon without being level 250 would be tantamount to committing suicide.”

“I guess that’s true,” Derek replied. “So, what is the completion reward for the dungeon?”

“According to this.” Alanah pulled out the map again. “The completion reward is potions. Potions are very common rewards for dungeons,” she explained. “Looking at the map, I’d say that at least thirty percent of the dungeons reward potions.”

“I see,” Derek said. “I imagine that if you’re looking for potions, there are much easier dungeons to take part in that offer them as rewards than this one?”

“Exactly,” the siren agreed.

“Do you know anything else about this dungeon?” Derek asked. He wondered if it was going to be a multiple stage dungeon like the first golem dungeon he’d completed.

“I do.” Alanah nodded, then smiled widely. “It seems to be a sort of wave-type dungeon with bosses.”

“Which means what, exactly?”

“It means that there will be multiple waves of golems with a boss golem included in each one, and there will be limited downtime between waves. Are you up for that?”

“Sounds pretty easy,” Derek said.

“Yeah,” Alanah chuckled. “Easy for you and me.”

“True,” Derek replied with a nod. “But it also seems kind of perfect for me, at least, if the waves of golems don’t actually include hundreds of them in each wave.” If that was the case, then he would basically gain his remaining 21 levels to level 250 in just a couple of runs, and he didn’t want that. He wanted to milk his lower level for skill gains as best he could. He knew it wouldn’t be long before he was forced to hit level 250, so he was going to make the most out of what he could.

“It doesn’t.” Alanah pointed at the map. “Looks like at least six regular golems in each wave, plus the boss, so seven enemies in each wave, minimum, but there shouldn’t ever be many more than that. Though, what we get is a bit random.”

“That shouldn’t be too bad, then,” Derek said. “Does it say what kind of golems we’ll be dealing with?” he asked.

“Nope.” Alanah shook her head. “According to this, it’s random. If we run it more than once, it should be different every time. Max level dungeons usually have something extra like this to make them harder since we can continuously complete them for rewards.”

“Ah.” Derek nodded. “A way for the system to stop or slow exploiting a single dungeon,” he said. It’s probably also why most of the dungeons have lower tier rewards. I bet the dungeons with better rewards are much harder—like the raid ones.

“Probably,” Alanah agreed, then took a step toward the dungeon orb. “Are you ready?”

“Let the adventure begin!”